Category: Creative Practice & Strategy

In Feb a new feature film called The Host will be released. It is a scary monster film that has already won numerous Korean Film awards, including Best Film and Best Director. I just checked out the trailer and at the end was some information that if you follow up on…you’ll find an ARG. Yes! An ARG! Very exciting. I think this is the first scary (movie) ARG. Enjoy, or should I say, run! 

Stranger Adventures, an interactive net drama, has been running for a couple of years. It has been nominated for an Emmy twice. There is an interview with the writers by Christie Taylor at the Writers University. Here is an excerpt:

How does writing for “Stranger Adventures” differ from screenwriting?

This is just like writing a screenplay to me in that you do have to write shootable scenes as if it were a movie script. However, each of the scenes you write don’t necessarily have to connect to the next one, so it’s like writing individual movies, some with beginning, middles and ends. Others have no ends, just cliffhangers.

When it comes to the e-mails [that characters send to players] it reminds me of when I first began to write screenplays and I used to explain what was going on in the scenes instead of letting information come out in the scene itself. Writing the e-mails to participants logging on and playing the game is committing one of the cardinal sins of screenwriting, where you tell the reader what’s going on in the scene rather than letting the scene speak for itself. I think it’s great in this format because you have to keep the viewer or the player interested and give juicy information without having to think of a clever way of showing it. This gives a very personal touch and allows the player to connect with the character like a real person.

Read the interview

This will be an interesting conference. I’m interested not just in the marketing of products, but of the transmedia expansions of entertainment properties (as I’ve discussed here).

Virtual Worlds Conference 2007 is the leading event for Fortune 500 businesses seeking to understand and maximize marketing and business strategies within virtual worlds.  Leading companies from Toyota to Starwood to Leo Burnett to Adidas are setting up presences in virtual worlds.  MTV has set up its own virtual world with Virtual Laguna Beach.  CBS will bring its Star Trek franchise into Second Life.

Virtual Worlds 2007 shows you how to succeed as a marketer in this rapidly growing segment of marketing, media, entertainment and commerce.  Separate buzz from success; hear from companies who’ve made the journey and learn from their experiments and activities; learn more about this technology trend and the consumers who inhabit virtual worlds.

Companies considering the following VW applications should attend: branding, entertainment, interactive television, social networking, promotion, education, ecommerce, employee collaboration, test-marketing, content generation, training, recruiting and new product development.

Check out: www.virtualworlds2007.com